Welcome to the Rehearsal Stage Drummer Jack Twomey invites you to listen to some classic big band tunes via full-length audio clips from rehearsals he has led over the years with The Jazz Thunder Big Band. To view videos of the band, Google Jack Twomey.
Trumpeters Charlie Franklin, Todd Walker, Larry Gillespie, and James Smith, as well as regulars Barry Bryson and Joe Kaminsky (not pictured) provide a dynamic force in the Jack Twomey Jazz Thunder Big Band.
Jack Twomey and the Jazz Thunder Big Band rehearses, pictured here, one of the best trombone sections in New York: Dale Turk, Ron Hay, Michael Engstrom and Alex Jeun. Tenor Saxophone player and arranger Peter Anderson at right. Bassist Ken Rizzo.
Many people made the Big Band Era possible. The late George T. Simon was one of the chief scribes of the Swing Era as Editor of Metronome Magazine. George was a close friend of Glenn Miller, as well as Miller's first recording session drummer. He was also an heir to the Simon and Shuster book publishing house, and an uncle of Carly Simon. George was always interesting to talk with between sets when his band played at the Red Blazer in NYC. His group played before my band performed on alternating Wednesday nights in the early 90's. His books on the big bands; "The Big Band Era", "Glenn Miller and His Orchestra", and "Simon Says: The Sights And Sounds of the Swing Era", were among the first books ever written about the Band Era, and are indispensible guides. "Sights and Sounds of the Swing Era" is filled with very rare pictures and his original reviews of hundreds of bands. He told me that he would have liked to have had it reprinted, but it never was.
Jack Twomey's Royal Manhattan Quartet plays the Sky Club, Met Life Building, New York. (L-R) Mark Hagen, Bass; Jack Twomey, Drums; Warren Chiasson, Vibes; Steve Gluzband, Trumpet.
